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oddinary4bts · 3 months ago

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Chasing Cars | ch 12.5 (jjk)

☆summary: when your brother goes to study on a semester abroad, your life collides with his best friend Jeon Jungkook, who's coincidentally your roommate. Will you survive the collision, or will you crumble into dust?

☆pairings: brother's best friend!Jungkook x younger sister!female reader

☆rating: 18+ (minors DNI, some chapters contain mature content)

☆genre: forbidden love?au, college!au, slice of life!au, smut, angst (as usual a lot of it), fluff

☆warnings: curses, alcohol, depression, panic attacks, unaliving attempt (ish, last scene of the drabble, do not read if it's triggering for you). basically jungkook's summer and he's severely depressed and almost proceeds to end it

☆word count: 4.6k

☆a/n: okay so this is an extremely tough one to read. the triggering scene is the last of the drabble, and I put a warning before it if you want to skip it! and if you ever need to talk, know that I'm here for you <3. I really relate to Jungkook's pain in this one, and I feel like I did not transcribe it well to paper, but I want you guys to have the drabble today so here it is :') hope you guys still enjoy even though it hurts like a bitch

☆series masterpost

☆☆☆☆☆

If I lay here If I just lay here Would you lie with me and just forget the world?

Chasing Cars, Snow Patrol

☆☆☆☆☆

Jungkook counts his heartbeats.

One, two…

Three.

He wonders if his heart will stop beating altogether. If the screaming in his head will mute, if the burning in his lungs will soothe away.

Everything hurts, and it’s all his fault.

It’s always his fault.

His right leg bounces up and down, and all he hears is you telling him it’s over. Over and over again.

If only he’d never made that promise to Gabrielle…

Nausea rushes in next, the taste of bile heavy on his tongue. The screaming intensifies, ripping his soul to shreds.

He lost you. He fucking lost you.

Not that he ever had you to begin with.

Tears threaten to fall, his vision blurring, but he blinks them away. He’s sitting outside on a park bench, the cool evening wind a caress on his features, yet he feels like he’s been dunked in an iceberg. He’s too cold, and his leg just keeps on bouncing up and down, up and down, up and down.

And his heart breaks and breaks, the screaming doesn’t falter, doesn’t quiet down.

He’s going to be sick. He barely drank yet he’s going to be sick. He doesn’t even dare close his eyes - all he can picture when he does so is you, and it breaks and breaks until he lets out a pained sound, hiding his face in his hands.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” he curses, and he rubs his face, rubs his eyes, tries to chase the tears on your cheeks away from his memory.

But you don’t falter - you only become clearer.

He lost you.

He should have told you he loved you before he left for Paris. Should have held you for a little longer - how could he have been so stupid?

The last time he kissed you… right next to the door. He barely remembers it. He should have known to commit it to memory. It’s already fading - the screaming overtakes the sound of your voice.

A tear slips free, and he dries it away. Like hell he’ll allow himself to cry when it’s all his fault.

He was trying. He was trying to do what you wanted, and it backfired in his face. Regrets burn brighter than the sun. And now he’ll have to learn how to live without you when he barely had you to begin with.

He straightens, sitting back against the bench. The leaves rustle in the wind, the moon shines on and on. Around him, it’s like the world hasn’t stopped. But it’s stopped for him - he collided with a wall at eighty miles per hour.

Can the screaming fucking stop?

He runs a hand through his hair, toys with his lip piercings, and then he gets up, hiding his hands in the pockets of his pants as he starts walking.

He’s lost. He’s lost in the city of love - how ironic.

He wants to scream, wants to punch a wall, wants to break down.

He wants to fly home and hold you close and never let go.

But he has to let you go. Has to let you fly. Your decision makes sense - even if it wasn’t for Gabrielle, Jungkook knows it never could have worked. He knew it on Valentine’s Day when he couldn’t resist but kiss you after wanting you for so, so long. He knew it the moment you melted against him, tasting sweeter than anything he’d ever tasted.

Like poison, disguised to strike when he’d be defenceless.

And as he walks the streets of Paris aimlessly, Jungkook wonders if he’ll make it out alive.

It takes him an hour and a half to realize he’s just been roaming, slowly but surely getting lost. With no clue how to retrace his steps, Jungkook leans against the wall, eyeing a rat running on the other side of the street. He tries to breathe, but his lungs are crushed under the weight of what just happened, and all he can think to do is grab his phone to call for help.

To call for help, to call for the one person that caused it all.

Gabrielle stops in front of him some time later, rolling down the window of her car. In another world, Jungkook would have teased her for driving a Porsche, for flaunting her money like that, but all he can do is open the door and crash in the passenger side.

“JK?” Gabrielle lets out.

He’s crying. He starts crying, and it’s weak and pathetic, and Gabrielle doesn’t say anything before driving away.

The tears recede. They recede before they get to their destination, and Jungkook is relieved when he sees that it’s not the Air Bnb. That it’s some kind of fancy apartment complex, and he follows behind Gabrielle as she leads him up the stairs and to her apartment. She unlocks the door, throwing him a concerned look, and he waits until they’re inside before talking.

Before voicing the pain in his heart.

“It’s your fault.”

Gabrielle gulps. “Do you want to sit down?”

“It’s your fucking fault,” is all Jungkook manages to repeat.

There’s a silence, and Gabrielle kicks off her shoes before heading towards the couch. Jungkook doesn’t register the luxurious apartment as he follows her in - it’s like the edges of his vision are red, and all he sees is the one thing that made him lose you.

“What happened?” Gabrielle asks as he sits.

“She ended things with me.” Jungkook rubs his face. “Because you kissed me yesterday.”

New tears slip free, and Jungkook hates them. Hates the weight that they bear on his heart, on his shoulders.

“Who ended things with you?”

Jungkook leans back against the couch, shutting his eyes. And then you’re everywhere, and he sees Valentine’s Day. He sees your sparkly eyes in New York, he remembers how you used to hold him.

You’ll never hold him again.

“OC.”

Gabrielle sighs. “Putain, Jungkook. You lied about her.”

“I didn’t have a choice,” Jungkook whispers, unable to put the blame on you. “She asked me not to tell anyone, and then Tae was on Facetime with her yesterday and she saw us kissing and she ended things, and I won’t even be able to give her the gift I got for her.”

“Jungkook,” Gabrielle says, voice gentle and soothing, and Jungkook only then realizes that he can’t fucking breathe.

He’s hyperventilating. Everything burns and he can’t breathe - maybe you truly were the oxygen in his lungs.

“Deep breaths,” Gabrielle tells him. “Breathe with me.”

Jungkook feels his entire body freezing up, locking up. As if the thought of living without you is the predator, and he is just the prey. But he breathes with Gabrielle, feels the wave of the panic pass until he’s drained, his hands shaking slightly.

“Tell her, Jungkook,” Gabrielle says then. “Tell her everything. I don’t care if she knows.”

“I love her so much,” he confesses, and he’s crying again.

Gabrielle slides closer to him, and she rubs his back as he cries. It’s not as comforting as it should be - in the end, he still lost you. And Gabrielle doesn’t understand that he can’t tell you. That, even if he did, he still lost you. Because you never wanted Taehyung to know.

That won’t change.

It’s not like he can tell you anyway. Because what would Taehyung think, if you were willing to tell your brother? Jungkook would need to tell Taehyung about Gabrielle’s secret too, and he can’t do that to her.

Not when they were all they had growing up.

“You tell her,” Gabrielle repeats. “S’il-te-plait, Jungkook. Don’t lose her for me. Ça ne vaut pas la peine.”

What she doesn’t understand is, he’s already lost you. And he didn’t even deserve you anyway, not when he always fucks everything up. If it wasn’t for Gabrielle yesterday, he would have found a way to fuck it all up by himself.

No matter how much it hurts, Jungkook knows that you’re better off without him.

*****

Jungkook rereads the letter he’s written. He’s surprised he managed to keep paper free of the tears that have been rolling down his cheeks.

They’ve been staining his sheets instead, as he cries and chases your scent on his pillow.

He’s painfully aware that you’ve been sleeping in his room. The carefully made bed and the neatly folded t-shirt that you left on the night table are clear indications of it. And though Jungkook hadn’t planned on going home for the summer, the second he saw his room, he knew he had to go.

He can’t be near you. Not right now, when every single one of his breaths cut like shards of glass. So he decided to go home for the summer, to face the wrath of his family because at least that is familiar, that is something he can deal with…

He clenches his jaw hard, blinking away the sudden onset of tears. It recedes without leaving the confines of his eyes, and he manages to finish rereading the letter.

He glances at the jewellery box on his night table next, and he dares to imagine what would have happened if you hadn’t broken up. He imagines your smile, your teasing when you’d realize he got you a gift. A cheesy one at that, but the second he’d seen it, he’d just known he had to get it for you. So he’d bought it while everyone was distracted by something else, hiding it deep in his pocket like you’d been hiding deep in his heart. So he imagines giving it to you again and again, your gentle laugh and light blush invading his thoughts. You kiss him to thank him, and he goes weak in the knees, because when doesn’t he go weak in the knees for you?

But life had other plans for you and him than the simple act of giving you a gift. Indeed, life decided distance was meant for you and him, and though he believes he might die from it, Jungkook just wants to respect your decision.

He gets up from his bed, knowing that he’ll never be able to leave the letter and the gift in your room if he doesn’t do it now. So he folds the letter, puts it in the envelope on which he already wrote your name, and then he goes to the door of his room.

Taehyung and Ariane left to do some quick groceries ten minutes ago, yet Jungkook still makes sure the apartment is silent before actually stepping out of his room, heading down the hallway towards yours. And though it aches and burns and stabs and pains, he pushes the door open.

Your room is unchanged. He can almost picture the two of you tangling in your bed during the power outage, but he ignores the memories - they haven’t been doing him any good after all. He gently puts the jewellery box and the letter on the bed, and then he takes a step back. Stops in the door frame, eyes your room once again. He takes it all in, inhales the lingering scent of your perfume - the vanilla one that he was obsessed with - and then he closes the door on you, on his story with you.

It aches so fiercely that he tumbles back, almost falls, and then he heads to his room, to hide his face in his sheets hoping that the pain might finally recede.

It doesn’t. Especially not when Ariane and Taehyung come back, laughing together, reminding Jungkook that not everyone is breaking. It’s only him, and he assumes you too, though he tries not to think about that too much, because the guilt would eat him alive.

The guilt does eat him alive when he hears you coming home from work later, when he wakes from troubled sleep. He hadn’t meant to fall asleep, but then he hears your voice, and he remembers when you were whispering against his skin in the dead of night.

He doesn’t let himself break again. Instead, he packs his duffel bag, and then lies on his bed again. If only so that he can listen to you a little more before saying goodbye.

Jungkook startles at the sound of a knock on his door. He sits up, heart beating wildly in his chest as he dares imagine it’s you. But it’s not - it’s Taehyung, and they exchange a long look before Taehyung speaks.

“You hungry?”

“Not really,” Jungkook immediately replies.

Taehyung slightly frowns, glancing at the duffel bag, but he doesn’t say anything. He softly shuts the door behind himself to head back to the kitchen, and Jungkook sits there, the beginning of a panic attack starting to squeeze his lungs.

He hadn’t had panic attacks since he was in high school, but it seems that losing you has ignited them again, and he’s had a couple of them over the last few days. But he tries to remember to breathe, to not let it get to his head, and though it takes a moment, he eventually calms down.

He has to go. Has to leave before the panic truly seizes him and he dies.

He’s up and out of his room a second later, and though he knew he was going to see you, he freezes in the kitchen’s doorway. He just looks at you - you look tired, exhausted, and your eyes are just as haunted as his.

He doesn’t know what he says. Just tries to commit you to memory - your eyes, your hair, the way he feels naked and seen when you look at him. He commits your lips to memory too, and tries to compose a song with your voice in his head, something to listen to when he’ll be gone.

And then he turns his back on you to go put his shoes on. He hears Taehyung follow him more than he sees him, yet Taehyung remains silent until Jungkook is outside, the fresh evening air a soothing balm for the new panic rising in his heart.

“Are you okay?” Taehyung asks.

It’s not the first time Taehyung has asked since Jungkook lost you, but the answer doesn’t change. “Yeah, all good,” Jungkook lies, turning to face Taehyung.

Taehyung seems fully unconvinced. “You know, if you need to talk, you can talk to me, right?”

Jungkook almost wants to laugh, because that’s the last thing he can do.

“Thanks,” he says. “I appreciate.”

There’s an awkward silence, and Taehyung sighs. “I don’t know what happened with you and Gaby, but JK, please don’t let that fuck you up like this.”

“I’m okay,” Jungkook insists, pain and anger seeping in his voice. “I just want to go home.”

Jungkook is too much of a coward to hold Taehyung’s gaze, and his eyes drop to a spot on the ground between them.

“Well in that case, drive safe,” Taehyung says. “And text me when you get there.”

Jungkook nods curtly. “Will do.”

It looks like Taehyung wants to say something else. Especially as he glances inside, but Jungkook doesn’t wait. He turns around, walks down the stairs, and heads to where his car is parked. Taehyung doesn’t call his name, but Jungkook feels the weight of his gaze on his back.

And though part of him wants to, he doesn’t look back.

*****

Jungkook has always hated his father’s office. He’s never liked visiting JJS pharmaceuticals, and it hasn’t changed now that he’s a full-grown adult who should be indifferent to corporate buildings and tailor-made suits and the formality of his dad’s luxurious office. Yet, he’s still intimidated, still feels like he shouldn’t be here…

But this office will be his one day, now that he’s accepted to take over the company because Junghyun chose to start his own.

The office stands at the top of a skyscraper, offering a beautiful view of Manhattan, yet Jungkook doesn’t like it. He feels too far from the people down in the street, barely visible from such a height that he’s not even sure if they’re real or not. Like he’s disconnected - no wonder all the money and power have gotten to his father’s head.

Jungkook looks over his shoulder as the door of the office opens. To his surprise, it’s his mother walking in, and she dismisses her bodyguard as she heads towards him.

“Jungkook,” she greets him in that cold way she’s always reserved for him.

He nods, turning to face the city again. “Mother.”

“I’m glad you have come to your senses.”

They were at the conference press earlier. Jungkook still feels like his eyes are burning from all the flashing lights, and his face still hurts from the fake smile he tried to keep on for the family image’s sake.

“I’m sorry?” he lets out.

“Though we are proud of Junghyun for his decision to start his own company, we’ve been worried about you taking over JJS,” she continues, entirely ignoring Jungkook.

He clenches his jaw, choosing to remain silent this time around.

“But then again, I think you just needed to have your eyes opened by that girl,” she adds. “What was her name again?”

Jungkook’s heart feels like it’s been thrown in acid at the reminder of you, but he still refuses to answer.

“Nothing strengthens a man more than heartbreak,” his mother finishes. “Right?”

He takes a deep breath, knowing that he’s expected to answer this. “I guess so.”

His mother surveys him with that cold look of hers, slightly shaking her head. “We warned you about her, Jungkook.”

“What you said had nothing to do with why we broke up,” Jungkook spits. “Stop fucking bringing it up all the time.”

His mother’s gaze barely widens at the curse, and Jungkook hates that she’s so used to being disappointed in him that she doesn’t even say anything.

“In time you will see that I am right,” she says. “That… girl was just out to take advantage of you. It’s good that she’s out of the picture now.”

Jungkook’s heart breaks, like it’s been breaking since Paris. Like it’s been breaking every time you cross his mind. He never thought he could hurt so much - hell, he hasn’t slept or eaten properly since he came back to New York, surviving off of coffee and Buldak noodles.

“If you ever say one more thing about her,” Jungkook seethes through his teeth, “I’m pulling out of the contract. JJS can go to fucking hell for all I care.”

He storms away. He doesn’t want to know what his mother has to say, just knows that he needs air and a glass of water before he collapses, the weight of his broken heart so heavy that he thinks it puts the weight of the universe to shame.

He truly has been breaking, shattering, crumbling to the ground. He never thought love could hurt so bad, but what is this pain if not the proof that he truly, fully loved you?

That night, Jungkook forces himself to eat a real meal. And though it tastes like ash, he reckons one day it might be able to overcome the taste of heartbreak that’s been lingering since he lost you.

***** (tw s**cide attempt-ish in this last scene, so please do not read if that is triggering for you)

Jungkook is drunk. He’s drunk and the city lies at his feet, the breeze fresh high up here. It plays in his hair, and he imagines it’s you instead. He imagines it’s your fingers, and that he can reach for you, if he dares to.

He takes a step closer to the edge, unsteady on his feet. Perhaps it’s the call of the emptiness in front of him - it’s so similar to the emptiness that has been his constant since he came back to New York and had that press conference. His mind is empty - there’s a hole where his emotions should be.

He’s a void. An empty husk, and two steps forward and he won’t have to deal with anything anymore. Won’t have to deal with his father calling him worthless - but hey, at least he’s talking to him again. Won’t have to deal with his mother calling him a disappointment, to deal with his brother ignoring his calls.

Won’t have to deal with the guilt of losing you.

He’s alone, and lonely, and guilty and everything in between. It’s fucking eating him alive.

Jungkook takes a swig of the wine bottle in his hand, and then takes another step forward. He’s not allowed to be on this part of the roof - he had to climb over a fence to get here, and he still hears the sounds of the party in the distance. But he’s out of sight, and Lisa hasn’t come looking for him yet.

He’s on the edge of the roof. All it would take is a strong gust of wind, and he’d finally be free. But he doesn’t take another step forward. Not yet. Not when he remembers you - your smile is soothing the pain in his chest, and he holds on to it, if only for a moment.

His phone starts ringing, and Jungkook startles, dropping the bottle of wine. It slips off the edge of the roof, and Jungkook watches it as it falls and falls, and then explodes when it hits the pavement. It’s gore, his brain pictures himself there instead, and he takes a step back.

Jungkook grabs his phone. It’s Lisa calling, but for a moment, he lets himself imagine it’s you. He almost believes it - he’d pick up, and you’d tell him that you miss him, and he’d admit he almost texted you every day since returning to New York. But it’s not you - in this universe, you don’t even talk at all anymore.

“Hey,” he says when he finally picks up.

“Where are you?” Lisa asks.

He looks around. “Just on the roof.”

There’s a silence as Lisa moves away from the music on her side of the line. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah.”

She doesn’t believe him. He knows she doesn’t, especially when she says, “Don’t move, okay? I’ll come find you.”

Jungkook nods. “Mmh.”

“But you have to tell me where you are,” she adds. “Do you think you can do that?”

“I’m on the roof,” Jungkook repeats, his tone flatter than the flatline that’s been echoing in his head since he lost you.

“Yes.” He thinks he hears her gulp, and then her voice is filled with panic. “Where are you exactly?”

“Ah,” Jungkook lets out. “There’s a fence on the roof. Climbed over that.”

“Jungkook…” Lisa trails off. “I’ll be right there in a moment, okay? Just wait for me.”

He makes a noncommittal sound, and just keeps looking at the shattered bottle down in the street. He has half a thought that it could have killed someone as it fell, yet he can’t bring himself to care. Not when a dark corner of his heart wishes it was him instead.

“Please stay on the line,” Lisa adds.

Jungkook doesn’t answer. Just listens to Lisa’s breathing as she makes her way to him. And then he hears the shuffle of her feet behind him, and he hangs his phone up, putting it back in his pocket.

“Hey,” Lisa says behind him. “Do you think you could step away from the edge of the roof?”

Jungkook shrugs. “What’s the point?”

“Please, Jungkook,” Lisa lets out.

He barely recognizes her voice through the panic it holds, and he glances at her over his shoulder.

“What’s the fucking point, Liz?”

“Just step away from the edge of the roof and then we can talk, okay?” she says.

He clenches his jaw. “I don’t know.”

“Please,” Lisa says again. “I just want us to sit here and talk.”

Jungkook turns, and he sways. His heart lurches in his chest - for a moment, he thinks he’ll fall. But then he steadies himself, and he walks away from the edge of the roof, sitting next to where Lisa is standing.

She’s crying. He notices she’s crying and that, more than anything, breaks the dam inside of him.

“Holy fuck, Liz,” he lets out, and the tears finally break free.

Lisa sits next to him, pulling him in her chest as he cries, sobs racking through him. The pain is sharp as ever, a knife stabbing through his chest repeatedly. Everything hits him all at once - his family’s hate, his inability to control his own future, you…

Yet the thing that hurts the most is the fact he lost you. Because he would have been able to live a life in hell if it’d been a life next to you but now…

Now he just feels lost.

“What’s going on with you?” Lisa asks through the tears that stains her own cheeks.

Jungkook lets out a bitter chuckle. “Everything. Everything’s wrong.”

“What happened?”

Jungkook takes a deep breath, and then he confesses his love for you. Because it always goes back to you, and he wishes you were here with him instead.

“I was in love with OC,” he says. “You were right. But I lost her, and my family hates me, and I’m going to have to work for my dad and I just feel like life is so shitty. I’m so tired, Liz, you have no idea.”

“Jungkook…” she whispers, and her arms tighten around him, like she’s trying to hold his pieces together. “I am so sorry. And I know no words can truly help, but you are not alone.”

“I can’t even speak to Tae anymore because I’m convinced he’ll hate me,” Jungkook adds, and he wipes his cheeks dry. “Fuck.”

“You have me,” she whispers.

He hates it. He wishes she wasn’t there - some part of him wishes she hadn’t stopped him. Because he knows she has feelings for him, it’s always been obvious, and he’s only going to hurt her, too.

“I really loved OC…” he confesses.

“I know.” She runs a soothing hand on his back. “What happened?”

Jungkook tells her about Paris, keeping Gabrielle’s secret a secret, as he’s done his entire life. It makes him look even worse, he’s aware of it - how can he justify cheating on you without saying the full truth?

Simple - he can’t. Yet Lisa doesn’t call him an asshole. Doesn’t seem to judge him at all. No, she listens to him all night, clearly relieved that he’s not trying to jump off the roof anymore. And when she tells him she’ll help him find a therapist, Jungkook agrees. He agrees, because he’s tired of hating himself so much. He’s tired of everything, but maybe it’s time he tries to make it better.

If only so that he can live long enough to see you again. Because he wants to see you again. Wants to hear your voice again, wants to make sure you’re okay, better than he is. He likes to think you are - you have your friends and your family, and he knows they wouldn’t let you down.

By the time the sun rises, the flow of words that have been cascading from his mouth slows down, leaving him empty, yet it’s not the same. The void isn’t as dark anymore, like maybe there’s a light at the end of the tunnel.

And though maybe he’ll break her heart one day by not being able to offer more than platonic friendship, Jungkook knows he’ll forever be thankful that Lisa stopped him from committing the irreparable.

Read chapter 12 here!

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yeah so... I know it doesn't justify what he did, and the kiss with gabrielle but... my babie is broken and he needs a big big hug (and a lot of therapy so thank you Lisa for suggesting it). Feel free to talk to me if you need it <3